Let me tell you about my still-never-met-in-person author friend, Louise. I love to applaud other writers and recommend their books. The book shown above is a page-turner. My cup of tea got cold because I couldn't put this book down.
I did have a problem. I thought I was reading my own writing--Louise and I are so in sync on topic, writing style, many mutual life experiences, long-term widowhood, a love for the Lord and desire to uplift the attitudes of our fellow calendar-challenged friends.
I'm a lifelong writer, but Louise's writing career began at age seventy-nine. Since then, she has written six outstanding books. Not having read her other books, although I intend to, I recommend this one without reservations.
Louise is not a newbie in life experience, however. She has taught in all levels of education from elementary school through college, and in the prison system. A widow since the passing of her husband in his fifties, she has raised her family, managed a Christian Retreat Center for fifteen years and served as the Spiritual Director in a psychiatric hospital.
Would you believe? She says her greatest accomplishments have been since her mid-seventies when she started going to China to teach in an underground Bible school! There we are in sync again with our China connection. And certainly in our mutual desire to leave a legacy through our writings and personal witness wherever the Lord has planted us.
Now in her late eighties, Louise is out there busily speaking to Christian Writer's Conferences, on radio, making YouTube videos with her humor and continuing to live it up--and write more.
MAKE THE REST OF YOUR DAYS THE BEST OF YOUR DAYS is no small book at 233 pages. How user-friendly is it? The ultimate: she has packed each chapter with her own life experience vignettes and those of others--you eagerly await her next illustration and it comes quickly. Her format is to use bite-sized, usually half-page topics with phrase appetizers to whet your appetite. Ideal for the diminishing attention span of the senior reader.
The subject Louise is exploring is the best real life exposition of the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes chapter 12 that I have ever read. Several thousand years ago, the author, King Solomon, gave a poetic but rather dismal description of what happens to an aging body--to any aging person then and now. Louise brings it up-to-date without sparing any punches with her personal, earthy illustrations. If you are anywhere near the AARP age you will relate to her uninhibited examples dished out with spice and humor.
She doesn't leave us dangling in suspense and depression as we face the deterioration of our mortal bodies, as the apostle Paul so well laid it out in 2 Corinthians chapter four, verses 16-18. Louise shows us, not just tells us, how not to "lose heart" with the downhill slide of our outer person, but to "be renewed day by day."
She demonstrates how a Christian can cultivate a godly, joyful life that radiates from within regardless of what is happening to our "earth suits." (We both use that term in our writing, although we didn't know each other or had ever read one another's writings until a few weeks ago.)
Louise is so well-grounded in God's Word and so adept at finding just the right verse to season her illustrations that her writing flows seamlessly. I was so sorry that her book ended. At the same time, there was satisfactory closure to the topic. I was left restless and yet recharged to continue applying the principles from the Word even into my own life as a nonagenarian.
My new friend didn't leave me without consolation. With her book came a CD of Scriptures For Encouragement read by Louise in her sweet Southern accent, accompanied by the gentle strains of background flute music of familiar hymns played by one of her granddaughters. I'm on my eighth listen-through since I slid the disk into my Toyota's CD player for my drives into town. The Word of God is "dwelling in [my ears] richly."
I must tell you where to find my friend Louise. www.louisellooney.com. Go there. Really. And beside this book, see what other book you can order and savor for yourself.
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